A teenager has been locked up after being found in possession of a knife and spitting at an officer while claiming he had Covid.
Lincoln Agate, of no fixed address, was found by police to be carrying a knife inside his tracksuit trouser leg as he walked along Parliament Street in Nottingham on 19 June 2021, at around 4.45pm.
After a community support officer noticed an object protruding from the top of his tracksuit bottoms and believed it to potentially be a knife, he began to follow the teenager before police officers intercepted him as he made his way towards the Victoria Centre.
Upon searching the 19-year-old officers pulled out a large combat knife in a sheath from down his tracksuit pants and attached it to a belt.
After police detained him the teenager then became aggressive and started shouting, screaming, swearing, and making threats towards the officers placing him inside a police van.
Agate carried on shouting at one officer, “I hope your mother dies of cancer” and “I’ve got Covid you know I hope you die”, before carrying on spitting at the cell walls inside the police van and kicking out.
The 19-year-old had to be further restrained once in police custody before he turned his head and spat at an officer with the spit luckily hitting the inside of the officer’s calf and thigh area,
Agate pleaded guilty to having a bladed article in public and common assault of an emergency worker.
He was sentenced to one year four months at a young offenders’ institution when he appeared at Nottingham Crown Court on Friday (27 August 2021).
Superintendent Suk Verma, from Nottinghamshire Police said: “Assaults of this kind are completely unacceptable and to treat our officers with complete contempt and disrespect when they are just trying to do their job, putting themselves at risk to protect people is a despicable act.
“Spitting in a bid to purposefully harm and put our officers at risk is completely unacceptable and I’m glad that he has now been dealt with swiftly by the courts.
“I welcome the courts sentencing of Agate which sends a clear message out. Knives will not be tolerated on our streets and that anyone who is found to be carrying a knife does face real consequences that can have a big impact on their future.
“Anyone found committing these disgraceful acts will be held as an example and treated with the utmost severity.”
